It’s time for this week’s blog and twitter round-up for last week. If you haven’t already, follow me on twitter (@StrateSQL). This is a good chance to catch up on data platform technology and career related information I’ve shared in the last week and activity on this blog.

Most Popular Article Shared

Last weeks most popular link is a blog post by John Sterrett (blog | @johnsterrett)  on his PASS Summit 2013 vendor session on root cause analysis in SQL Server.  While it doesn’t have the session itself, the post includes the resources he used in building the session.  Some good stuff included there.

'Opportunity doesn't make appointments, you have to be ready when it arrives.'

? Tim Fargo
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Last Week’s Popular Posts

The most popular posts on this blog in the week are:

1. 31 Days of SSIS – The Introduction (669)
2. Get Just The Tools: SSMS Download (338)
3. 31 Days of SSIS – Raw Files Are Awesome (1/31) (290)
4. 31 Days of SSIS as a Book (266)
5. Looking to SQL Server 2014 High Availability In Standard Edition (191)
6. Security Questions: Difference Between db_datawriter and db_ddladmin? (147)
7. XQuery for the Non-Expert – Value (141)
8. Determining Filegroup for a Table (139)
9. Security Questions: Removing Logins From Databases (111)
10. Security Questions: What permissions are required to create temporary tables? (90)

Last Week’s Top 20 “Reading” Links

Along with the most popular link, here are the top twenty items relating to SQL Server, technology and careers that were shared last week. If you missed them throughout the week, here’s the opportunity to get caught up on some items that other’s read after I linked them out.

1. SQL Server Performance Root Cause Analysis in 10 Minutes [71 clicks]
2. What’s the Age Limit for Becoming a DBA? [35 clicks]
3. Naming conventions are poison. [20 clicks]
4. Collection of Baseline Scripts [19 clicks]
5. 3 Ways Availability Groups Beat Database Mirroring [19 clicks]
6. A more complex discussion of user transactions and memory-optimized tables [15 clicks]
7. The Importance of a Full Backup in SQL Server [14 clicks]
8. Fundamentals of Storage Systems – Capturing IO Patterns [14 clicks]
9. How to Talk People Out of the SA Account, Option 2 [14 clicks]
10. Creating the Cluster [13 clicks]
11. Fundamentals of Storage Systems, Solid State Storage Basics [13 clicks]
12. Using SQL Sentry Plan Explorer to Shed Light on Estimated Execution Plans [13 clicks]
13. Understanding SQL Server Query Optimization – Part 3 [12 clicks]
14. A new superpower for SQL query tuners – Number of Rows Read [12 clicks]
15. SQL Server XQuery: .query() method [12 clicks]
16. Fundamentals of Storage Systems – Disk Controllers, Host Bus Adapters, and Interfaces [11 clicks]
17. Using SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) with Always Encrypted [10 clicks]
18. SQL 2016 – It Just Runs Faster: DBCC Scales 7x Better [10 clicks]
19. 3 Steps to Take Back Your Time [10 clicks]
20. Introduction to Apache Hive and Pig [9 clicks]

Last Week’s Posts From Previous Years

Sometimes the most useful content on a blog wasn’t written in the past week, it’s often other articles shared in the past that resonate with readers. Check out the following links that I published in past years over the past week:

1. XQuery for the Non-Expert – Aggregates (2011-03-07)
2. Aggregating With Correlated Sub-Queries #tsql2sday (2011-03-08)
3. Grouping and Rounding Dates (2010-03-10)
4. Using SELECT INTO with UNION Statements (2016-03-11)
5. XML Datasources (2007-03-12)

Other Items Shared

Of course, no week would be complete without a few off-topic links. These have nothing to do with technology or your career, but they are interesting and worth a second look.

1. Here’s What Hapened When Some Dude Ate Like The Rock For A Month [37 clicks]
2. Choke Court [19 clicks]
3. Rey from Star Wars Deadlifted 176 Pounds. How Does that Make You Feel? [18 clicks]
4. Why are so many smart people such idiots about philosophy? [16 clicks]
5. Go Rey! [13 clicks]
6. AC/DC Reschedule 10 Shows Due to Injury [9 clicks]

Got something you think I should read and share, leave a comment below. Also, if you want to see all of the links that were tweeted out last week?